Israel
}}| }}}} | common_name = Israel | image_flag = Flag of Israel.png | alt_flag = Centered blue star within a horizontal triband | image_coat = Emblem of Israel.svg.png | alt_coat = Centered menorah surrounded by two olive branches | symbol_type = Emblem | national_anthem = "Hatikvah" ( ) | image_map = ISR orthographic.svg.png | alt_map = Location of Israel (in green) on the globe. | image_map2 = Israel - Location Map (2012) - ISR - UNOCHA.svg.png | map_caption2 = 1967 border (Green Line) | capital = Jerusalem (limited recognition) Russia (West Jerusalem), the Czech Republic (West Jerusalem), Honduras, Guatemala, Guatemala's embassy was located in Jerusalem until the 1980s, when it was moved to Tel Aviv. Nauru, and the United States. }} | coordinates = | largest_city = capital | official_languages = Hebrew | languages_type = Recognized languages | languages = Arabic In 2018 it was classified as having a 'special status in the state' with its use by state institutions to be set in law. }} | ethnic_groups = | ethnic_groups_year = 2019 | religion = | religion_year = 2019 | demonym = Israeli | government_type = Unitary parliamentary republic | leader_title1 = President | leader_name1 = Reuven Rivlin | leader_title2 = Prime Minister | leader_name2 = Benjamin Netanyahu | leader_title3 = Knesset Speaker | leader_name3 = Yuli Edelstein | leader_title4 = Chief Justice | leader_name4 = Esther Hayut | legislature = Knesset | sovereignty_type = Independence | established_event1 = Declared | established_date1 = 14 May 1948 | established_event2 = Admission to UNO | established_date2 = 11 May 1949 | area_km2 = 20,770–22,072 | area_sq_mi = 8,019–8,522 | area_rank = 150th | area_footnote = | percent_water = 2.1 | population_estimate = | population_estimate_year = | population_estimate_rank = 99th | population_census = 7,412,200 | population_census_year = 2008 | population_density_km2 = |22072|km2|prec=0|disp=num}} | population_density_rank= 35th | GDP_PPP = $353.645 billion [http://mas.ps/files/server/20141911093442-1.pdf Quarterly Economic and Social Monitor], Volume 26, October 2011, p. 57: "When Israel bid in March 2010 for membership in the 'Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development'... some members questioned the accuracy of Israeli statistics, as the Israeli figures (relating to gross domestic product, spending and number of the population) cover geographical areas that the Organization does not recognize as part of the Israeli territory. These areas include East Jerusalem, Israeli settlements in the West Bank and the Golan Heights."}} | GDP_PPP_rank = 54th | GDP_PPP_year = 2019 | GDP_PPP_per_capita = $39,106 | GDP_PPP_per_capita_rank= 35th | GDP_nominal = $390.656 billion | GDP_nominal_rank = 32nd | GDP_nominal_year = 2019 | GDP_nominal_per_capita = $43,199 | GDP_nominal_per_capita_rank = 20th | Gini = 42.8 | Gini_ref = | Gini_rank = 48th | Gini_year = 2013 | HDI_year = 2017 | HDI = 0.903 | HDI_change = increase | HDI_rank = 22nd | HDI_ref = | currency = New shekel ( ) | currency_code = ILS | time_zone = IST | utc_offset = +2 | time_zone_DST = IDT | utc_offset_DST = +3 | date_format = (AM)|dd-mm-yyyy (CE)}} | drives_on = right | cctld = .il | iso3166code = IL | calling_code = +972 | official_website = | footnote_a = 20,770 km2 is Israel within the Green Line. 22,072 km2 includes the annexed Golan Heights (c. ) and East Jerusalem (c. ). | today= }} Israel ( ; ; ), also known as the State of Israel ( ), is a country in Western Asia, located on the southeastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea and the northern shore of the Red Sea. It has land borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the northeast, Jordan on the east, the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip to the east and west, respectively, and Egypt to the southwest. The country contains geographically diverse features within its relatively small area. Israel's economic and technological center is Tel Aviv, while its seat of government and proclaimed capital is Jerusalem, although the state's sovereignty over Jerusalem has only partial recognition.The Controversial Sovereignty over the City of Jerusalem (22 June 2015, The National Catholic Reporter) "No U.S. president has ever officially acknowledged Israeli sovereignty over any part of Jerusalem (...) The refusal to recognize Jerusalem as Israeli territory is a near universal policy among Western nations.""UN General Assembly Resolution 181 recommended the creation of an international zonea, or corpus separatum, in Jerusalem to be administered by the UN for a 10-year period, after which there would be referendum to determine its future. This approach applies equally to West and East Jerusalem and is not affected by the occupation of East jerusalem in 1967. To a large extent it is this approach that still guides the diplomatic behaviour of states and thus has greater force in international law" (Susan M. Akram, Michael Dumper, Michael Lynk, Iain Scobbie (eds.), International Law and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: A Rights-Based Approach to Middle East Peace, Routledge, 2010 p. 119. )Jerusalem: Opposition to mooted Trump Israel announcement grows"Israeli sovereignty over Jerusalem has never been recognised internationally"Whither Jerusalem (Lapidot) p. 17: "Israeli control in west Jerusalem since 1948 was illegal and most states have not recognized its sovereignty there"The Jerusalem Law states that "Jerusalem, complete and united, is the capital of Israel" and the city serves as the seat of the government, home to the President's residence, government offices, supreme court, and parliament. United Nations Security Council Resolution 478 (20 August 1980; 14–0, U.S. abstaining) declared the Jerusalem Law "null and void" and called on member states to withdraw their diplomatic missions from Jerusalem (see ). See Status of Jerusalem for more information. Israel has evidence of the earliest migration of hominids out of Africa.Charles A. Repenning & Oldrich Fejfar, [http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v299/n5881/abs/299344a0.html Evidence for earlier date of 'Ubeidiya, Israel, hominid site] Nature 299, 344–347 (23 September 1982) Canaanite tribes are archaeologically attested since the Middle Bronze Age,Encyclopædia Britannica article on Canaan while the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah emerged during the Iron Age. The Neo-Assyrian Empire destroyed Israel around 720 BCE. Judah was later conquered by the Babylonian, Persian and Hellenistic empires and had existed as Jewish autonomous provinces. |year=2007|publisher=Society of Biblical Lit|isbn=978-1-58983-145-2|pages=195–}} The successful Maccabean Revolt led to an independent Hasmonean kingdom by 110 BCE, |year=2013|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-518831-8|pages=184–187}} which in 63 BCE however became a client state of the Roman Republic that subsequently installed the Herodian dynasty in 37 BCE, and in 6 CE created the Roman province of Judea. |year=1976|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-39731-6|pages=223–239}} Judea lasted as a Roman province until the failed Jewish revolts resulted in widespread destruction, the expulsion of the Jewish population and the renaming of the region from Iudaea to Syria Palaestina. |year=2005|publisher=Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing|isbn=978-0-8028-2416-5|pages=15–}} Jewish presence in the region has persisted to a certain extent over the centuries. In the 7th century CE, the Levant was taken from the Byzantine Empire by the Arabs and remained in Muslim control until the First Crusade of 1099, followed by the Ayyubid conquest of 1187. The Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt extended its control over the Levant in the 13th century until its defeat by the Ottoman Empire in 1517. During the 19th century, national awakening among Jews led to the establishment of the Zionist movement in the diaspora followed by waves of immigration to Ottoman Syria and later Mandatory Palestine. In 1947, the United Nations (UN) adopted a Partition Plan for Palestine recommending the creation of independent Arab and Jewish states and an internationalized Jerusalem. The plan was accepted by the Jewish Agency, and rejected by Arab leaders. The following year, the Jewish Agency declared the independence of the State of Israel, and the subsequent 1948 Arab–Israeli War saw Israel's establishment over most of the former Mandate territory, while the West Bank and Gaza were held by neighboring Arab states. Israel has since fought several wars with Arab countries, and since the Six-Day War in 1967 held occupied territories including the West Bank, Golan Heights and the Gaza Strip (still considered occupied after the 2005 disengagement, although some legal experts dispute this claim). It extended its laws to the Golan Heights and East Jerusalem, but not the West Bank. Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories is the world's longest military occupation in modern times. See for example: * |quote=The Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza is the longest military occupation in modern times.}} * * |quote=longest-lasting military occupation of the modern age|title=Palestine Inside Out: An Everyday Occupation|publisher=W.W. Norton & Company|date=2010|isbn=978-0-393-33844-7}} * * * |page=22|date=2014|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-968542-4|quote=Although the basic philosophy behind the law of military occupation is that it is a temporary situation modem occupations have well demonstrated that rien ne dure comme le provisoire A significant number of post-1945 occupations have lasted more than two decades such as the occupations of Namibia by South Africa and of East Timor by Indonesia as well as the ongoing occupations of Northern Cyprus by Turkey and of Western Sahara by Morocco. The Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories, has already entered its fifth decade.}} * Azarova, Valentina. 2017, Israel's Unlawfully Prolonged Occupation: Consequences under an Integrated Legal Framework, European Council on Foreign Affairs Policy Brief: "June 2017 marks 50 years of Israel's belligerent occupation of Palestinian territory, making it the longest occupation in modern history." Efforts to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict have not resulted in a final peace agreement. However, peace treaties between Israel and both Egypt and Jordan have been signed. In its Basic Laws, Israel defines itself as a Jewish and democratic state and the nation state of the Jewish people. The country has a liberal democracy (one of only two in the Middle East and North Africa region, the other being Tunisia), with a parliamentary system, proportional representation, and universal suffrage. . "A current list of liberal democracies includes: Andorra, Argentina, ..., Cyprus, ..., Israel, ..." The prime minister is head of government and the Knesset is the legislature. With a population of around 9 million as of 2019, Israel is a developed country and an Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) member, has the 31st or 32nd-largest economy in the world by nominal gross domestic product (GDP), and is the richest (nominal GDP) and the most developed country currently in conflict (100–999 deaths per year). . It has the highest standard of living in the Middle East, and ranks among the world's top countries by percentage of citizens with military training,IISS 2018, pp. 339-340 percentage of citizens holding a tertiary education degree, research and development spending by GDP percentage, women's safety, life expectancy, innovativeness, and happiness. Etymology (13th century BCE). The majority of biblical archeologists translate a set of hieroglyphs as "Israel," the first instance of the name in the record.]] Upon independence in 1948, the country formally adopted the name "State of Israel" ( |help=no}} ; ) after other proposed historical and religious names including Eretz Israel ("the Land of Israel"), Zion, and Judea, were considered but rejected. In the early weeks of independence, the government chose the term "Israeli" to denote a citizen of Israel, with the formal announcement made by Minister of Foreign Affairs Moshe Sharett. The names Land of Israel and Children of Israel have historically been used to refer to the biblical Kingdom of Israel and the entire Jewish people respectively. The name "Israel" (Hebrew: Yisraʾel, Isrāʾīl; Septuagint Israēl; 'El (God) persists/rules', though after often interpreted as "struggle with God")William G. Dever, [https://books.google.com/books?id=IGR7-OSz7bUC&pg=PA186 Did God Have a Wife?: Archaeology and Folk Religion in Ancient Israel], Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2005 p. 186.Geoffrey W. Bromiley, 'Israel,' in International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: E–J,''Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 1995 p. 907.R.L. Ottley, [https://books.google.com/books?id=AWZsAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA32 ''The Religion of Israel: A Historical Sketch,] Cambridge University Press, 2013 pp. 31–32 note 5. entry "Jacob". in these phrases refers to the patriarch Jacob who, according to the Hebrew Bible, was given the name after he successfully wrestled with the angel of the Lord."And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed." (Genesis, 32:28, 35:10). See also Hosea 12:5. Jacob's twelve sons became the ancestors of the Israelites, also known as the Twelve Tribes of Israel or Children of Israel. Jacob and his sons had lived in Canaan but were forced by famine to go into Egypt for four generations, lasting 430 years, until Moses, a great-great grandson of Jacob, led the Israelites back into Canaan during the "Exodus". The earliest known archaeological artifact to mention the word "Israel" as a collective is the Merneptah Stele of ancient Egypt (dated to the late 13th century BCE). . "The Merneptah Stele ... is arguably the oldest evidence outside the Bible for the existence of Israel as early as the 13th century BCE." The area is also known as the Holy Land, being holy for all Abrahamic religions including Judaism, Christianity, Islam and the Bahá'í Faith. Under British Mandate (1920–1948), the whole region was known as Palestine ( ). Through the centuries, the territory was known by a variety of other names, including Canaan, Djahy, Samaria, Judea, Yehud, Iudaea, Syria Palaestina and Southern Syria. History Prehistory The oldest evidence of early humans in the territory of modern Israel, dating to 1.5 million years ago, was found in Ubeidiya near the Sea of Galilee. Other notable Paleolithic sites include the caves Tabun, Qesem and Manot. The oldest fossils of anatomically modern humans found outside Africa are the Skhul and Qafzeh hominins, who lived in the area that is now northern Israel 120,000 years ago. Around 10th millennium BCE, the Natufian culture existed in the area. Antiquity , archaeological site in Jerusalem]] The early history of the territory is unclear. Modern archaeology has largely discarded the historicity of the narrative in the Torah concerning the patriarchs, The Exodus, and the conquest of Canaan described in the Book of Joshua, and instead views the narrative as constituting the Israelites' national myth. |pages=98–99 |quote=After a century of exhaustive investigation, all respectable archaeologists have given up hope of recovering any context that would make Abraham, Isaac, or Jacob credible "historical figures" ... archaeological investigation of Moses and the Exodus has similarly been discarded as a fruitless pursuit.}} During the Late Bronze Age (1550–1200 BCE), large parts of Canaan formed vassal states paying tribute to the New Kingdom of Egypt, whose administrative headquarters lay in Gaza. Ancestors of the Israelites are thought to have included ancient Semitic-speaking peoples native to this area. The Israelites and their culture, according to the modern archaeological account, did not overtake the region by force, but instead branched out of these Canaanite peoples and their cultures through the development of a distinct monolatristic—and later monotheistic—religion centered on Yahweh.Tubb, 1998. pp. 13–14Mark Smith in "The Early History of God: Yahweh and Other Deities of Ancient Israel" states "Despite the long regnant model that the Canaanites and Israelites were people of fundamentally different culture, archaeological data now casts doubt on this view. The material culture of the region exhibits numerous common points between Israelites and Canaanites in the Iron I period (c. 1200–1000 BCE). The record would suggest that the Israelite culture largely overlapped with and derived from Canaanite culture... In short, Israelite culture was largely Canaanite in nature. Given the information available, one cannot maintain a radical cultural separation between Canaanites and Israelites for the Iron I period." (pp. 6–7). Smith, Mark (2002) "The Early History of God: Yahweh and Other Deities of Ancient Israel" (Eerdman's)Rendsberg, Gary (2008). "Israel without the Bible". In Frederick E. Greenspahn. The Hebrew Bible: New Insights and Scholarship. NYU Press, pp. 3–5Gnuse 1997, pp. 28, 31 The archaeological evidence indicates a society of village-like centres, but with more limited resources and a small population.Lehman in Vaughn 1992, pp. 156–162. Villages had populations of up to 300 or 400, which lived by farming and herding, and were largely self-sufficient; economic interchange was prevalent. Writing was known and available for recording, even in small sites. and Judah in the 9th century BCE]] While it is unclear if there was ever a United Monarchy, |language=en|chapter=The History of Israel in the Biblical Period}} there is well-accepted archeological evidence referring to "Israel" in the Merneptah Stele which dates to about 1200 BCE;K.L. Noll, [https://books.google.com/books?id=hMeRK7B1EsMC&pg=PA139 Canaan and Israel in Antiquity: A Textbook on History and Religion,] A&C Black, 2012, rev.ed. pp. 137ff.Thomas L. Thompson, [https://books.google.com/books?id=RwrrUuHFb6UC&pg=PA275 Early History of the Israelite People: From the Written & Archaeological Sources,] Brill, 2000 pp. 275–276: 'They are rather a very specific group among the population of Palestine which bears a name that occurs here for the first time that at a much later stage in Palestine's history bears a substantially different signification.'The personal name "Israel" appears much earlier, in material from Ebla. ; and and the Canaanites are archaeologically attested in the Middle Bronze Age (2100–1550 BCE).Jonathan M Golden,[https://books.google.com/books?id=EResmS5wOnkC&pg=PA3 Ancient Canaan and Israel: An Introduction,] OUP, 2009 pp. 3–4. |page=35|isbn=978-0-664-22727-2}} There is debate about the earliest existence of the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah and their extent and power, but historians agree that a Kingdom of Israel existed by 900 BCE and that a Kingdom of Judah existed by 700 BCE.The Pitcher Is Broken: Memorial Essays for Gosta W. Ahlstrom, Steven W. Holloway, Lowell K. Handy, Continuum, 1 May 1995 Quote: "For Israel, the description of the battle of Qarqar in the Kurkh Monolith of Shalmaneser III (mid-ninth century) and for Judah, a Tiglath-pileser III text mentioning (Jeho-) Ahaz of Judah (IIR67 = K. 3751), dated 734-733, are the earliest published to date." The Kingdom of Israel was destroyed around 720 BCE, when it was conquered by the Neo-Assyrian Empire. |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |year=2001 |page=174 |isbn=978-1-84127-201-6}} Classical period , one of the Dead Sea Scrolls, written during the Second Temple period]] With successive Persian rule, the autonomous province Yehud Medinata was gradually developing back into urban society, largely dominated by Judeans. The Greek conquests largely skipped the region without any resistance or interest. Incorporated into the Ptolemaic and finally the Seleucid empires, the southern Levant was heavily hellenized, building the tensions between Judeans and Greeks. The conflict erupted in 167 BCE with the Maccabean Revolt, which succeeded in establishing an independent Hasmonean Kingdom in Judah, which later expanded over much of modern Israel, as the Seleucids gradually lost control in the region. The Roman Empire invaded the region in 63 BCE, first taking control of Syria, and then intervening in the Hasmonean Civil War. The struggle between pro-Roman and pro-Parthian factions in Judea eventually led to the installation of Herod the Great and consolidation of the Herodian kingdom as a vassal Judean state of Rome. With the decline of the Herodian dynasty, Judea, transformed into a Roman province, became the site of a violent struggle of Jews against Greco-Romans, culminating in the Jewish–Roman wars, ending in wide-scale destruction, expulsions, and genocide. Jewish presence in the region significantly dwindled after the failure of the Bar Kokhba revolt against the Roman Empire in 132 CE.Oppenheimer, A'haron and Oppenheimer, Nili. Between Rome and Babylon: Studies in Jewish Leadership and Society. Mohr Siebeck, 2005, p. 2. Nevertheless, there was a continuous small Jewish presence and Galilee became its religious center. The Mishnah and part of the Talmud, central Jewish texts, were composed during the 2nd to 4th centuries CE in Tiberias and Jerusalem. The region came to be populated predominantly by Greco-Romans on the coast and Samaritans in the hill-country. Christianity was gradually evolving over Roman Paganism, when the area stood under Byzantine rule. Through the 5th and 6th centuries, the dramatic events of the repeated Samaritan revolts reshaped the land, with massive destruction to Byzantine Christian and Samaritan societies and a resulting decrease of the population. After the Persian conquest and the installation of a short-lived Jewish Commonwealth in 614 CE, the Byzantine Empire reconquered the country in 628. Middle Ages and modern history , an ancient Jewish village, abandoned some time between the 7th–13th centuries CE.Judaism in late antiquity, Jacob Neusner, Bertold Spuler, Hady R Idris, Brill, 2001, p. 155]] In 634–641 CE, the region, including Jerusalem, was conquered by the Arabs who had recently adopted Islam. Control of the region transferred between the Rashidun Caliphs, Umayyads, Abbasids, Fatimids, Seljuks, Crusaders, and Ayyubids throughout the next three centuries. During the siege of Jerusalem by the First Crusade in 1099, the Jewish inhabitants of the city fought side-by-side with the Fatimid garrison and the Muslim population who tried in vain to defend the city against the Crusaders. When the city fell, around 60,000 people were massacred, including 6,000 Jews seeking refuge in a synagogue. |accessdate=1 January 2012|year=2009|publisher=University Press of America|isbn=978-0-7618-4097-8|page=132}} At this time, a full thousand years after the fall of the Jewish state, there were Jewish communities all over the country. Fifty of them are known and include Jerusalem, Tiberias, Ramleh, Ashkelon, Caesarea, and Gaza.Carmel, Alex. The History of Haifa Under Turkish Rule. Haifa: Pardes, 2002 ( ), pp. 16–17 According to Albert of Aachen, the Jewish residents of Haifa were the main fighting force of the city, and "mixed with Saracen Fatimid troops", they fought bravely for close to a month until forced into retreat by the Crusader fleet and land army. |year=2012|publisher=CUA Press|isbn=978-0-8132-1969-1 |pages=48–49 |quote=citizens of the Jewish race, who lived in the city by the favour and consent of the king of Egypt in return for payment of tribute, got on the walls bearing arms and put up a very stubborn defence, until the Christians, weighed down by various blows over the period of two weeks, absolutely despaired and held back their hands from any attack. ... the Jewish citizens, mixed with Saracen troops, at once fought back manfully,... and counter-attacked. [Albert of Aachen, Historia Ierosolimitana 7.23, ed. and transl. Susan B. Edgington (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2007), 516 and 521.] }} In 1165, Maimonides visited Jerusalem and prayed on the Temple Mount, in the "great, holy house."Sefer HaCharedim Mitzvat Tshuva Chapter 3. Maimonides established a yearly holiday for himself and his sons, 6 Cheshvan, commemorating the day he went up to pray on the Temple Mount, and another, 9 Cheshvan, commemorating the day he merited to pray at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron. In 1141, the Spanish-Jewish poet Yehuda Halevi issued a call for Jews to migrate to the Land of Israel, a journey he undertook himself. In 1187, Sultan Saladin, founder of the Ayyubid dynasty, defeated the Crusaders in the Battle of Hattin and subsequently captured Jerusalem and almost all of Palestine. In time, Saladin issued a proclamation inviting Jews to return and settle in Jerusalem, |accessdate=26 December 2011|year=1987|publisher=KTAV Publishing House, Inc.|isbn=978-0-88125-108-1|page=277|chapter=Sultan Saladin Opens Jerusalem to Jews}} and according to Judah al-Harizi, they did: "From the day the Arabs took Jerusalem, the Israelites inhabited it." |accessdate=26 December 2011|year=1974|publisher=Aldus Books|page=217|chapter=From Bar Kochba's Revolt to the Turkish Conquest}} Al-Harizi compared Saladin's decree allowing Jews to re-establish themselves in Jerusalem to the one issued by the Persian king Cyrus the Great over 1,600 years earlier. |accessdate=26 December 2011|year=2007|publisher=Pen & Sword Military|isbn=978-1-84415-499-9|page=xiii}} in Jerusalem]] In 1211, the Jewish community in the country was strengthened by the arrival of a group headed by over 300 rabbis from France and England, |accessdate=21 December 2011|year=1990|publisher=L. Reichert|isbn=978-3-88226-479-1|page=31}} among them Rabbi Samson ben Abraham of Sens.Samson ben Abraham of Sens, Jewish Encyclopedia. Nachmanides (Ramban), the 13th-century Spanish rabbi and recognised leader of Jewry, greatly praised the Land of Israel and viewed its settlement as a positive commandment incumbent on all Jews. He wrote "If the gentiles wish to make peace, we shall make peace and leave them on clear terms; but as for the land, we shall not leave it in their hands, nor in the hands of any nation, not in any generation." |accessdate=23 December 2011|year=2006|publisher=Devora Publishing|isbn=978-1-932687-70-5|page=302}} In 1260, control passed to the Mamluk sultans of Egypt. The country was located between the two centres of Mamluk power, Cairo and Damascus, and only saw some development along the postal road connecting the two cities. Jerusalem, although left without the protection of any city walls since 1219, also saw a flurry of new construction projects centred around the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound on the Temple Mount. In 1266, the Mamluk Sultan Baybars converted the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron into an exclusive Islamic sanctuary and banned Christians and Jews from entering, who previously had been able to enter it for a fee. The ban remained in place until Israel took control of the building in 1967. International Dictionary of Historic Places: Middle East and Africa by Trudy Ring, Robert M. Salkin, Sharon La Boda, pp. 336–339 , 1870s]] In 1470, Isaac b. Meir Latif arrived from Italy and counted 150 Jewish families in Jerusalem. |accessdate=23 December 2011|year=1976|publisher=Israel Economist|page=48|author-link=Dan Bahat}} Thanks to Joseph Saragossi who had arrived in the closing years of the 15th century, Safed and its environs had developed into the largest concentration of Jews in Palestine. With the help of the Sephardic immigration from Spain, the Jewish population had increased to 10,000 by the early 16th century. |accessdate=25 December 2011|year=1976|publisher=Hyperion Press|isbn=978-0-88355-304-6|page=145}} In 1516, the region was conquered by the Ottoman Empire; it remained under Turkish rule until the end of the First World War, when Britain defeated the Ottoman forces and set up a military administration across the former Ottoman Syria. In 1660, a Druze revolt led to the destruction of Safed and Tiberias.Joel Rappel, History of Eretz Israel from Prehistory up to 1882 (1980), vol. 2, p. 531. "In 1662 Sabbathai Sevi arrived to Jerusalem. It was the time when the Jewish settlements of Galilee were destroyed by the Druze: Tiberias was completely desolate and only a few of former Safed residents had returned...." In late 18th century, local Arab Sheikh Zahir al-Umar created a de facto independent Emirate in the Galilee. Ottoman attempts to subdue the Sheikh failed, but after Zahir's death the Ottomans regained control of the area. In 1799 governor Jazzar Pasha successfully repelled an assault on Acre by troops of Napoleon, prompting the French to abandon the Syrian campaign. In 1834 a revolt by Palestinian Arab peasants broke out against Egyptian conscription and taxation policies under Muhammad Ali. Although the revolt was suppressed, Muhammad Ali's army retreated and Ottoman rule was restored with British support in 1840.Macalister and Masterman, 1906, p. 40 Shortly after, the Tanzimat reforms were implemented across the Ottoman Empire. In 1920, after the Allies conquered the Levant during World War I, the territory was divided between Britain and France under the mandate system, and the British-administered area which included modern day Israel was named Mandatory Palestine. "Mandate for Palestine," Encyclopaedia Judaica, Vol. 11, p. 862, Keter Publishing House, Jerusalem, 1972 Zionism and British Mandate , visionary of the Jewish state|alt=Black and white portrait of a long-bearded man.]] Since the existence of the earliest Jewish diaspora, many Jews have aspired to return to "Zion" and the "Land of Israel", "Zionism, the urge of the Jewish people to return to Palestine, is almost as ancient as the Jewish diaspora itself. Some Talmudic statements ... Almost a millennium later, the poet and philosopher Yehuda Halevi ... In the 19th century ..." though the amount of effort that should be spent towards such an aim was a matter of dispute. The hopes and yearnings of Jews living in exile are an important theme of the Jewish belief system. After the Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492, some communities settled in Palestine. . "Jews sought a new homeland here after their expulsions from Spain (1492) ..." During the 16th century, Jewish communities struck roots in the Four Holy Cities—Jerusalem, Tiberias, Hebron, and Safed—and in 1697, Rabbi Yehuda Hachasid led a group of 1,500 Jews to Jerusalem. In the second half of the 18th century, Eastern European opponents of Hasidism, known as the Perushim, settled in Palestine. |align = left |width = 240px }} The first wave of modern Jewish migration to Ottoman-ruled Palestine, known as the First Aliyah, began in 1881, as Jews fled pogroms in Eastern Europe. The source provides information on the First, Second, Third, Fourth and Fifth Aliyot in their respective articles. The White Paper leading to Aliyah Bet is discussed Although the Zionist movement already existed in practice, Austro-Hungarian journalist Theodor Herzl is credited with founding political Zionism, "How did Theodor Herzl, an assimilated German nationalist in the 1880s, suddenly in the 1890s become the founder of Zionism?" a movement that sought to establish a Jewish state in the Land of Israel, thus offering a solution to the so-called Jewish question of the European states, in conformity with the goals and achievements of other national projects of the time. In 1896, Herzl published Der Judenstaat (The Jewish State), offering his vision of a future Jewish state; the following year he presided over the First Zionist Congress. The Second Aliyah (1904–14), began after the Kishinev pogrom; some 40,000 Jews settled in Palestine, although nearly half of them left eventually. Both the first and second waves of migrants were mainly Orthodox Jews, . "As with the First Aliyah, most Second Aliyah migrants were non-Zionist orthodox Jews ..." although the Second Aliyah included socialist groups who established the kibbutz movement. During World War I, British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour sent the Balfour Declaration to Baron Rothschild (Walter Rothschild, 2nd Baron Rothschild), a leader of the British Jewish community, that stated that Britain intended for the creation of a Jewish "national home" within the Palestinian Mandate. In 1918, the Jewish Legion, a group primarily of Zionist volunteers, assisted in the British conquest of Palestine. Arab opposition to British rule and Jewish immigration led to the 1920 Palestine riots and the formation of a Jewish militia known as the Haganah (meaning "The Defense" in Hebrew), from which the Irgun and Lehi, or the Stern Gang, paramilitary groups later split off. . "During the First and Second Aliyot, there were many Arab attacks against Jewish settlements ... In 1920, Hashomer was disbanded and Haganah ("The Defense") was established." In 1922, the League of Nations granted Britain the Mandate for Palestine under terms which included the Balfour Declaration with its promise to the Jews, and with similar provisions regarding the Arab Palestinians. The population of the area at this time was predominantly Arab and Muslim, with Jews accounting for about 11%, and Arab Christians about 9.5% of the population. The Third (1919–23) and Fourth Aliyahs (1924–29) brought an additional 100,000 Jews to Palestine. The rise of Nazism and the increasing persecution of Jews in 1930s Europe led to the Fifth Aliyah, with an influx of a quarter of a million Jews. This was a major cause of the Arab revolt of 1936–39 during which the British Mandate authorities alongside the Zionist militias of Haganah and Irgun killed 5,032 Arabs and wounded 14,760, |title=A History of Zionism: From the French Revolution to the Establishment of the State of Israel|accessdate=15 October 2015|publisher=Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group|author=Walter Laqueur|year=2009|isbn=978-0-307-53085-1}} resulting in over ten percent of the adult male Palestinian Arab population killed, wounded, imprisoned or exiled.Khalidi, Walid (1987). From Haven to Conquest: Readings in Zionism and the Palestine Problem Until 1948. Institute for Palestine Studies. The British introduced restrictions on Jewish immigration to Palestine with the White Paper of 1939. With countries around the world turning away Jewish refugees fleeing the Holocaust, a clandestine movement known as Aliyah Bet was organized to bring Jews to Palestine. By the end of World War II, the Jewish population of Palestine had increased to 33% of the total population. After World War II proclaiming the Israeli Declaration of Independence on 14 May 1948]] , marking the end of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War]] After World War II, Britain found itself in intense conflict with the Jewish community over Jewish immigration limits, as well as continued conflict with the Arab community over limit levels. The Haganah joined Irgun and Lehi in an armed struggle against British rule. At the same time, hundreds of thousands of Jewish Holocaust survivors and refugees sought a new life far from their destroyed communities in Europe. The Yishuv attempted to bring these refugees to Palestine but many were turned away or rounded up and placed in detention camps in Atlit and Cyprus by the British. |year=2013|publisher=UPNE|isbn=978-1-61168-388-2|page=130}} }} On 22 July 1946, Irgun attacked the British administrative headquarters for Palestine, which was housed in the southern wingThe Terrorism Ahead: Confronting Transnational Violence in the Twenty-First | By Paul J. Smith | M.E. Sharpe, 2007 | p. 27 of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem.Encyclopedia of Terrorism, Harvey W. Kushner, Sage, 2003 p. 181Encyclopædia Britannica article on the Irgun Zvai LeumiThe British Empire in the Middle East, 1945–1951: Arab Nationalism, the United States, and Postwar Imperialism. William Roger Louis, Oxford University Press, 1986, p. 430 A total of 91 people of various nationalities were killed and 46 were injured.Clarke, Thurston. By Blood and Fire, G.P. Puttnam's Sons, New York, 1981 The hotel was the site of the Secretariat of the Government of Palestine and the Headquarters of the British Armed Forces in Mandatory Palestine and Transjordan. The attack initially had the approval of the Haganah. It was conceived as a response to Operation Agatha (a series of widespread raids, including one on the Jewish Agency, conducted by the British authorities) and was the deadliest directed at the British during the Mandate era. It was characterized as one of the "most lethal terrorist incidents of the twentieth century." The Jewish insurgency continued throughout the rest of 1946 and 1947 despite repressive efforts by the British military and Palestine Police Force to stop it. British efforts to mediate a negotiated solution with Jewish and Arab representatives also failed as the Jews were unwilling to accept any solution that did not involve a Jewish state and suggested a partition of Palestine into Jewish and Arab states, while the Arabs were adamant that a Jewish state in any part of Palestine was unacceptable and that the only solution was a unified Palestine under Arab rule. In February 1947, the British referred the Palestine issue to the newly formed United Nations. On 15 May 1947, the General Assembly of the United Nations resolved that the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine be created "to prepare for consideration at the next regular session of the Assembly a report on the question of Palestine." In the Report of the Committee dated 3 September 1947 to the General Assembly, the majority of the Committee in Chapter VI proposed a plan to replace the British Mandate with "an independent Arab State, an independent Jewish State, and the City of Jerusalem ... the last to be under an International Trusteeship System." Meanwhile, the Jewish insurgency continued and peaked in July 1947, with a series of widespread guerrilla raids culminating in the sergeants affair. After three Irgun fighters had been sentenced to death for their role in the Acre Prison break, a May 1947 Irgun raid on Acre Prison in which 27 Irgun and Lehi militants were freed, the Irgun captured two British sergeants and held them hostage, threatening to kill them if the three men were executed. When the British carried out the executions, the Irgun responded by killing the two hostages and hanged their bodies from eucalyptus trees, booby-trapping one of them with a mine which injured a British officer as he cut the body down. The hangings caused widespread outrage in Britain and were a major factor in the consensus forming in Britain that it was time to evacuate Palestine. In September 1947, the British cabinet decided that the Mandate was no longer tenable, and to evacuate Palestine. According to Colonial Secretary Arthur Creech Jones, four major factors led to the decision to evacuate Palestine: the inflexibility of Jewish and Arab negotiators who were unwilling to compromise on their core positions over the question of a Jewish state in Palestine, the economic pressure that stationing a large garrison in Palestine to deal with the Jewish insurgency and the possibility of a wider Jewish rebellion and the possibility of an Arab rebellion put on a British economy already strained by World War II, and the mounting criticism the government faced in failing to find a new policy for Palestine in place of the White Paper of 1939.Hoffman, Bruce: Anonymous Soldiers (2015) On 29 November 1947, the General Assembly adopted Resolution 181 (II) recommending the adoption and implementation of the Plan of Partition with Economic Union. The plan attached to the resolution was essentially that proposed by the majority of the Committee in the report of 3 September. The Jewish Agency, which was the recognized representative of the Jewish community, accepted the plan. The Arab League and Arab Higher Committee of Palestine rejected it, and indicated that they would reject any other plan of partition. On the following day, 1 December 1947, the Arab Higher Committee proclaimed a three-day strike, and Arab gangs began attacking Jewish targets. The Mandate collapsed into civil war as the British evacuated Palestine and refused to implement the partition resolution. As Arab militias and gangs attacked Jewish areas, they were faced mainly by the Haganah, as well as the smaller Irgun and Lehi. Jewish forces were mainly on the defensive until early April 1948, when the Haganah moved onto the offensive. The Arab Palestinian economy collapsed and 250,000 Palestinian Arabs fled or were expelled. On 14 May 1948, the day before the expiration of the British Mandate, David Ben-Gurion, the head of the Jewish Agency, declared "the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz-Israel, to be known as the State of Israel."Clifford, Clark, "Counsel to the President: A Memoir", 1991, p. 20. The only reference in the text of the Declaration to the borders of the new state is the use of the term Eretz-Israel ("Land of Israel"). The following day, the armies of four Arab countries—Egypt, Syria, Transjordan and Iraq—entered what had been British Mandatory Palestine, launching the 1948 Arab–Israeli War; contingents from Yemen, Morocco, Saudi Arabia and Sudan joined the war. The apparent purpose of the invasion was to prevent the establishment of the Jewish state at inception, and some Arab leaders talked about driving the Jews into the sea. |year=2004|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-135-77513-1|page=469|quote=some of the Arab armies invaded Palestine in order to prevent the establishment of a Jewish state, Transjordan...}} According to Benny Morris, Jews felt that the invading Arab armies aimed to slaughter the Jews. The Arab league stated that the invasion was to restore law and order and to prevent further bloodshed. After a year of fighting, a ceasefire was declared and temporary borders, known as the Green Line, were established. Jordan annexed what became known as the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Egypt took control of the Gaza Strip. The UN estimated that more than 700,000 Palestinians were expelled by or fled from advancing Israeli forces during the conflict—what would become known in Arabic as the Nakba ("catastrophe"). Some 156,000 remained and became Arab citizens of Israel. Early years of the State of Israel Israel was admitted as a member of the UN by majority vote on 11 May 1949. Both Israel and Jordan were genuinely interested in a peace agreement but the British acted as a brake on the Jordanian effort in order to avoid damaging British interests in Egypt. |year=1984|publisher=Clarendon Press|isbn=978-0-19-822960-5|page=579 | quote="The transcript makes it clear that British policy acted as a brake on Jordan." "King Abdullah was personally anxious to come to agreement with Israel", Kirkbride stated, and in fact it was our restraining influence which had so far prevented him from doing so." Knox Helm confirmed that the Israelis hoped to have a settlement with Jordan, and that they now genuinely wished to live peacefully within their frontiers, if only for economic reasons"}} In the early years of the state, the Labor Zionist movement led by Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion dominated Israeli politics. The kibbutzim, or collective farming communities, played a pivotal role in establishing the new state. Immigration to Israel during the late 1940s and early 1950s was aided by the Israeli Immigration Department and the non-government sponsored Mossad LeAliyah Bet ("Institute for Immigration B") which organized illegal and clandestine immigration. Both groups facilitated regular immigration logistics like arranging transportation, but the latter also engaged in clandestine operations in countries, particularly in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, where the lives of Jews were believed to be in danger and exit from those places was difficult. Mossad LeAliyah Bet was disbanded in 1953.Segev, Tom. 1949: The First Israelis. "The First Million". Trans. Arlen N. Weinstein. New York: The Free Press, 1986. Print. pp. 105–107 The immigration was in accordance with the One Million Plan. The immigrants came for differing reasons: some held Zionist beliefs or came for the promise of a better life in Israel, while others moved to escape persecution or were expelled. Laskier, Michael "Egyptian Jewry under the Nasser Regime, 1956–70" pp. 573–619 from Middle Eastern Studies, Volume 31, Issue # 3, July 1995 p. 579. Geography and environment Israel is located in the Levant area of the Fertile Crescent region. The country is at the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea, bounded by Lebanon to the north, Syria to the northeast, Jordan and the West Bank to the east, and Egypt and the Gaza Strip to the southwest. It lies between latitudes 29° and 34° N, and longitudes 34° and 36° E. The sovereign territory of Israel (according to the demarcation lines of the 1949 Armistice Agreements and excluding all territories captured by Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War) is approximately in area, of which two percent is water. However Israel is so narrow (100 km at its widest, compared to 400 km from north to south) that the exclusive economic zone in the Mediterranean is double the land area of the country. The total area under Israeli law, including East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights, is , and the total area under Israeli control, including the military-controlled and partially Palestinian-governed territory of the West Bank, is . Despite its small size, Israel is home to a variety of geographic features, from the Negev desert in the south to the inland fertile Jezreel Valley, mountain ranges of the Galilee, Carmel and toward the Golan in the north. The Israeli coastal plain on the shores of the Mediterranean is home to most of the nation's population. East of the central highlands lies the Jordan Rift Valley, which forms a small part of the Great Rift Valley. The Jordan River runs along the Jordan Rift Valley, from Mount Hermon through the Hulah Valley and the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea, the lowest point on the surface of the Earth. Further south is the Arabah, ending with the Gulf of Eilat, part of the Red Sea. Unique to Israel and the Sinai Peninsula are makhteshim, or erosion cirques. The largest makhtesh in the world is Ramon Crater in the Negev, . "The extraordinary Makhtesh Ramon – the largest natural crater in the world ..." which measures . A report on the environmental status of the Mediterranean Basin states that Israel has the largest number of plant species per square meter of all the countries in the basin. Demographics of Israel]] As of , Israel's population was an estimated , of whom 74.2% were recorded by the civil government as Jews. Arabs comprised 20.9% of the population, while non-Arab Christians and people who have no religion listed in the civil registry made up 4.8%. Over the last decade, large numbers of migrant workers from Romania, Thailand, China, Africa, and South America have settled in Israel. Exact figures are unknown, as many of them are living in the country illegally, but estimates run from 166,000 to 203,000.Adriana Kemp, "Labour migration and racialisation: labour market mechanisms and labour migration control policies in Israel", Social Identities 10:2, 267–292, 2004 By June 2012, approximately 60,000 African migrants had entered Israel. About 92% of Israelis live in urban areas. Data published by the OECD in 2016 estimated the average life expectancy of Israelis at 82.5 years, making it the 6th-highest in the world. Israel was established as a homeland for the Jewish people and is often referred to as a Jewish state. The country's Law of Return grants all Jews and those of Jewish ancestry the right to Israeli citizenship. Retention of Israel's population since 1948 is about even or greater, when compared to other countries with mass immigration. Jewish emigration from Israel (called yerida in Hebrew), primarily to the United States and Canada, is described by demographers as modest, but is often cited by Israeli government ministries as a major threat to Israel's future. Three quarters of the population are Jews from a diversity of Jewish backgrounds. Approximately 75% of Israeli Jews are born in Israel, 16% are immigrants from Europe and the Americas, and 7% are immigrants from Asia and Africa (including the Arab world). Jews from Europe and the former Soviet Union and their descendants born in Israel, including Ashkenazi Jews, constitute approximately 50% of Jewish Israelis. Jews who left or fled Arab and Muslim countries and their descendants, including both Mizrahi and Sephardi Jews, form most of the rest of the Jewish population. Jewish intermarriage rates run at over 35% and recent studies suggest that the percentage of Israelis descended from both Sephardi and Ashkenazi Jews increases by 0.5 percent every year, with over 25% of school children now originating from both communities. Around 4% of Israelis (300,000), ethnically defined as "others", are Russian descendants of Jewish origin or family who are not Jewish according to rabbinical law, but were eligible for Israeli citizenship under the Law of Return. The total number of Israeli settlers beyond the Green Line is over 600,000 (≈10% of the Jewish Israeli population). , 399,300 Israelis lived in West Bank settlements, including those that predated the establishment of the State of Israel and which were re-established after the Six-Day War, in cities such as Hebron and Gush Etzion bloc. In addition to the West Bank settlements, there were more than 200,000 Jews living in East Jerusalem, and 22,000 in the Golan Heights. Approximately 7,800 Israelis lived in settlements in the Gaza Strip, known as Gush Katif, until they were evacuated by the government as part of its 2005 disengagement plan. Major urban areas There are four major metropolitan areas: Gush Dan (Tel Aviv metropolitan area; population 3,854,000), Jerusalem metropolitan area (population 1,253,900), Haifa metropolitan area (population 924,400), and Beersheba metropolitan area (population 377,100). Israel's largest municipality, in population and area, is Jerusalem with residents in an area of . Israeli government statistics on Jerusalem include the population and area of East Jerusalem, which is widely recognized as part of the Palestinian territories under Israeli occupation. Although East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights have been brought directly under Israeli law, by acts that amount to annexation, both of these areas continue to be viewed by the international community as occupied, and their status as regards the applicability of international rules is in most respects identical to that of the West Bank and Gaza. Tel Aviv and Haifa rank as Israel's next most populous cities, with populations of and , respectively. Israel has 16 cities with populations over 100,000. In all, there are 77 Israeli localities granted "municipalities" (or "city") status by the Ministry of the Interior,2.22 Localities and Population, by Municipal Status and District, 2018 four of which are in the West Bank. Two more cities are planned: Kasif, a planned city to be built in the Negev, and Harish, originally a small town that is being built into a large city since 2015. Notes References |page=429|first=Andrew|last=Sanger|title=The Contemporary Law of Blockade and the Gaza Freedom Flotilla|journal=Yearbook of International Humanitarian Law 2010|volume=13|editor1=M.N. Schmitt|editor2=Louise Arimatsu|editor3=Tim McCormack|date=2011|isbn=978-90-6704-811-8|quote=Israel claims it no longer occupies the Gaza Strip, maintaining that it is neither a Stale nor a territory occupied or controlled by Israel, but rather it has 'sui generis' status. Pursuant to the Disengagement Plan, Israel dismantled all military institutions and settlements in Gaza and there is no longer a permanent Israeli military or civilian presence in the territory. However the Plan also provided that Israel will guard and monitor the external land perimeter of the Gaza Strip, will continue to maintain exclusive authority in Gaza air space, and will continue to exercise security activity in the sea off the coast of the Gaza Strip as well as maintaining an Israeli military presence on the Egyptian-Gaza border. and reserving the right to reenter Gaza at will. Israel continues to control six of Gaza's seven land crossings, its maritime borders and airspace and the movement of goods and persons in and out of the territory. Egypt controls one of Gaza's land crossings. Troops from the Israeli Defence Force regularly enter pans of the territory and/or deploy missile attacks, drones and sonic bombs into Gaza. Israel has declared a no-go buffer zone that stretches deep into Gaza: if Gazans enter this zone they are shot on sight. Gaza is also dependent on israel for inter alia electricity, currency, telephone networks, issuing IDs, and permits to enter and leave the territory. Israel also has sole control of the Palestinian Population Registry through which the Israeli Army regulates who is classified as a Palestinian and who is a Gazan or West Banker. Since 2000 aside from a limited number of exceptions Israel has refused to add people to the Palestinian Population Registry. It is this direct external control over Gaza and indirect control over life within Gaza that has led the United Nations, the UN General Assembly, the UN Fact Finding Mission to Gaza, International human rights organisations, US Government websites, the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office and a significant number of legal commentators, to reject the argument that Gaza is no longer occupied.|doi=10.1007/978-90-6704-811-8_14|series=Yearbook of International Humanitarian Law}} * |quote=Even after the accession to power of Hamas, Israel's claim that it no longer occupies Gaza has not been accepted by UN bodies, most States, nor the majority of academic commentators because of its exclusive control of its border with Gaza and crossing points including the effective control it exerted over the Rafah crossing until at least May 2011, its control of Gaza's maritime zones and airspace which constitute what Aronson terms the 'security envelope' around Gaza, as well as its ability to intervene forcibly at will in Gaza.}} * |quote=While Israel withdrew from the immediate territory, Israel still controlled all access to and from Gaza through the border crossings, as well as through the coastline and the airspace. ln addition, Gaza was dependent upon Israel for water electricity sewage communication networks and for its trade (Gisha 2007. Dowty 2008). ln other words, while Israel maintained that its occupation of Gaza ended with its unilateral disengagement Palestinians – as well as many human right organizations and international bodies – argued that Gaza was by all intents and purposes still occupied.}} }} Bibliography * * * * * * * |accessdate=12 May 2013|year=2004|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan Limited|isbn=978-1-4039-1338-8|ref=harv}} * * * * * * * * * * * * |publisher=Westminster John Knox |isbn=978-0-664-22265-9 |ref=harv}} * |isbn=978-1-62032-208-6 |ref=harv}} * * |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0-300-14524-3 |ref=harv}} * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * External links ; Government * Government services and information website * About Israel at the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs * Official website of the Israel Prime Minister's Office * Official website of the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics * GoIsrael.com by the Israel Ministry of Tourism ; General information * * * Israel at the Jewish Virtual Library * Israel at the OECD * Key Development Forecasts for Israel from International Futures * ; Maps * * Category:Israel Category:1948 establishments in Asia Category:Arabic-speaking countries and territories Category:Countries in Asia Category:Eastern Mediterranean Category:Levant Category:Member states of the Union for the Mediterranean Category:Member states of the United Nations Category:Middle Eastern countries Category:Near Eastern countries * Category:Political entities in the Land of Israel Category:Republics Category:States and territories established in 1948 Category:Western Asian countries Category:Articles containing video clips Category:Jewish polities